The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1887-07-25
Every Morning Except Sundays.
SUBSCRIPTIONS I:
CREMATION IN ALASKA.
Curious Customs that Follow Dealt
WHY the Bodies Burn Wen.

Curious Customs that Follow Death.
Why the Bodies Burn Well.
Having had information the other day of IA
cremation to take place at the Indian village,
! went to the beach to witness it. The de
funct siwas was known around Juneau as
Frank, and was formerly employed at Mar
tin Bros store in the capacity of Indian clerk,
and the hickman ut being double crema-
ton OF one of each SEX had been called
Jennie, both, as it happened, having died of
consumption. The mourning service con-
sisted of the ancient ceremony known as
"potlatch" which is always customary among
the Indians of southeastern Alaska on the Oc-
casiOn of a death of one of their number
The potlatch is division of whatever tenn
poral goods the deceased may have possessed,
such as blankets, dry goods, etc, among his
or her relations, according as the merits of
each individual case may justify.
In the services of the mourning, which are
very long, and to the Indian mind very i'm
pressive, the first in the order of the day is a
eulogistic discourse by one of the old men,
which being delivered by him in sections, 50
to speak, is taken up and sung by the rest III
a monOtonOus sort of chant; the old man is
then superseded by another venerable buck,
who goes through the same service, and he in
turn by another, until all the old men have
had their individual say. The chanters keep
beating on q drum. TSis performance being
gone over for a day or two, the pOtlatch takes
place
The body of the deceased is first wrapped
in a mating woven from split roots and i'll
appearance resembling coarse straw. They
then convey the body to the place of crema-
tion which is always on the beach at high
water mark. On this occasion they had on
hand for the purpose of burning the two
bodies about one cord of wood, some split and
some in small logs. First platform of small
logs is laid a foot from the ground, with q
space of four inches between each log. On
this pyre. which was about seven feet long by
five feet wide, the two bodies were placed
about three feet apart, and around them a
miniature log hut was built to a height of
four feet; the inclosed space is then carefully
filed in with split wood and fine kindling,
and now, everything being i'll readiness, the
fire is lighted from the bottom The native
diet being chiefly salmon, on oily substance,
the bodies of the Indians seem to contain
considerable amount of oil, as they burn very
readily. While the Corpses were charming,
he&iends of the deceased continued to poke
them with long sticks, occasionally raking
the fragments of burnt flesh from the fire
and wrapping them in skins, blankets, etc.
Returning from the cremation of the two
natives heard singing in a native house, and
dropped in to see what was going on.
There was quite an assemblage of natives
squatted around a small fire in the center of
the room, and at one end of the house the
corpse of an old woman lay, covered with
sheets and blankets All around the room
was strung up muslin, pieces of calico and
few blankets; also, three umbrellas, etc, all
of which will be distributed among the rela-
tives and near friends. Then the process de-
scribed above will be gone through. Alaska
Free Press